UK Aid Match is a fund set up by the UK government’s Department for International Development (DFID) to give a boost to public support for charities working in the developing world. Two current grant holders who have now completed their public appeals are delighted to share with you how your donations will be invested.

Stop the Childhood Cancer Clock campaign
Minister Harriett Baldwin joined members of the World Child Cancer team to celebrate the success of the charity’s recent appeal to Stop the Childhood Cancer Clock. The campaign raised almost £850,000 to support children with cancer and their families in developing countries around the world.

World Child Cancer currently runs programmes in Malawi, Ghana, Cameroon, Bangladesh, Philippines, Myanmar, Mexico, and a six-country collaboration in Africa for a common kidney tumour. The programmes help to educate, and train staff involved in the care of children, improve facilities, develop locally appropriate therapy, and provide holistic patient care.

Thanks to the incredible generosity of the UK public, the Stop the Childhood Cancer Clock campaign raised £434,239 – of which £415,717 was matched by the UK Government’s Aid Match scheme. The matched funds will be used to support children with cancer in Ghana to gain a faster route to better treatment whilst public funds will be used to support families affected by cancer in the six other countries in which the charity works.

The campaign focused on the fact that a child with cancer in a developing country dies every three minutes, with over 300,000 new cases of childhood cancer developing each year. In developed countries like the UK a child has an 80% chance of survival but in developing ones this figure drops to as low as 10%. World Child Cancer has helped to increase childhood cancer survival rates in its programme by improving treatment standards, training healthcare professionals, covering family costs for essential treatment, and raising awareness of childhood cancer.

Adam O’Kane, Director of Fundraising and Communications at the charity comments: “The children of today are the leaders, singers, artists and teachers of tomorrow. Your support helps us to move us closer to a world where every child with cancer has equal access to the best treatment and care.”

Food in a Fragile World campaign
Concern Worldwide (UK) has announced that its Food in a Fragile World appeal has raised more than £1.7million.

Concern Worldwide is an international humanitarian organisation specialising in tackling hunger amongst the most vulnerable people. Donations to the appeal from the UK public totalled just over £850,000 before being doubled by the UK government as part of its UK Aid Match scheme.

The matched funding will help to establish a new project to tackle hunger and build sustainable sources of food in Burundi, East Africa. More than 1.7 million people in the country do not have enough to eat.

The project in Burundi will focus on improving the nutrition and health of 43,000 children under the age of five in Cibitoke, one of the worst-affected areas with high levels of food insecurity. These children represent about half of all under-fives in the province. It will help children like three-year-old Edmond and his older brother, both of whom are malnourished. The family live in one of Burundi’s poorest areas and struggle to eat once a day. Their father Jean-Marie said: “Our situation is so bad, the boys…are not in good health.”

Rose Caldwell, Executive Director of Concern (UK), adds: “We are extremely grateful to everyone who supported our appeal to reduce childhood malnutrition and its underlying causes in fragile places like Burundi. It is only through the generosity of people across the UK that we are able to help ensure a brighter future for the world’s most vulnerable people”.